The Spirit of All Star and Hoo Ra Lives On

Hello all, I hope you all had a good week. Last time we spoke was in Augusta, in the library there, a wonderful librarian named Susan, offered a rideunexpectedly and we took it. After a lond night of prep for Scapegoat Wilderness we were off with Suusan at 7 in the morning. It turns out she gave us a ride too give us the dirt on Augusta, she explained the intricacies and interactions of the towns people, and her husbands ranch, and the intensity of work done by the cattle ranchers. They take 5 minutes to decide who becomes hamburger and who doesnt and this dtermines their success in the owrld of cattle farming. In stantly on the trail my tendon tightened up and would make me lame for the next 60 miles. We made it a few miles before running into a fellow through hiker. We stopped for lunch and recognized Lynn to be the creator of The How To Hike the Continental Divide videos. We ate and shared stories and ideas with each other, then provided him with an image of us discussing the merits and shortcomings of fat free turkey peperoni. Lynn is now filiming a video about his hike specifically, hope it keeps going well buddy, we'll probably leap frog soon enough!
We continued through a burn area and found a spring gushing from the ground, the only other unfiltered water we drank was 50 feet from the top of a mountain, higher up or farther down the water the better I guess. We squished the mossy slopes and the wildflowers culminating around and wet our lips from this ice cold spring. After sitting we watched the butterflies form clouds of purple and orange. After this we reached a small pass and saw the rest of our way. At our first camp sight late in the night a couple Marcy and Retro, came into the area and cowboy camped on the porch.We all would have quite a day the next. The next day we ended up meeting at a junction, in a tragedy of the commons, we somehow legitimized a bushwq hack that sent us all way off target. They went ahead, we followed and immediately back tracked for we saw this was not our direction. We cut our losses and set up for a long next two days. The next morning, done with my boots, I decided I would hike in socks and sandals, previously I cut the liners from my running shorts and my boxers were poking out, needless to say I did not get those at Deveroes. We walked along great ridges, watched Vistas that took us 60 plus miles, from Bob Marshall to the north to Eastertn plains. We viewed Elk crazing in valleys, and descended for water. While eating an early dinner,rain came as we took shelter under a Douglas fir. This quickly turned into hail O <twice this big, WHOA! The ground turned into a bag of popcorn with icy kernels bouncing all around, the pellets welted our finger tips, and left an ice pebble beach to walk on. After this more rain and a wrond turn pitted us on a very high ridge with night falling with fifty feet of visibility. We were forced to set up tents and deal with circumstances. Our real threat lightning was becoming brighter and more apparent the later it got. I found my self in a stand of trees contemplating whther or not to get in my antenna that i sleep under. Alex and I entered are tents after much rationalization, he read and I became a God fearing believer for an hour before a postioned my body for a direct current transfer to the ground and went to sleep. The closer you get to the sky the more intimidating it becomes. I woke up in the night from a dream that my tent slid down the hill twenty feet, I tried to scoot my tent where it was. I called to Alex for bearings and he reponded,"We're alive!", yes we were. We came from our tents to realize we still had no visibilty. We walked alond a five mile ridge with little more than our heading and rock cairns. Clouds swept through us and where i could normally see miles, Alex was only a shape. We spotted a Mountain Lion print. And came upon a hawk when it took off and disappeared before it was very close to us. The sound startled me. By noon we descended a bit, we looked out the clouds parted like a drape and opened up a view of mountains and ridges, now we could find outr way. This dream sequence continued for rest of the day. We lunched at Lewis and Clark Pass where Merriweather Lewis stopped in 1806 on his return East, on that day his travel mate wounded a moose, his dog worried much. We summitted Green Mountain with the pace of a pack mule, this provided excellent vistas to the Eastern Plains and North to the Bob Marshall Wilderness and beyond? We made it by night fall and camped next to the high way after some failed hitch attempts. In the morning Lynn headed south by our camp, we chatted about our and his trials and tribulations, exitting he exclaimed, "The spirit of allstar and hoo ra live on", yep. We found a guy Jeff on the road and ended up getting a ride to the Sportsman lodge with Rick. He renovarted his Dodge van to look like a log cabin on the inside, very cozy. Now I write from Lincoln, the home of the Unibomber and the biggest (stuffed) Grizzly in the lower 48. We went to the post office where it all went down, I imagined it differently. Now we are refueling. Rick gave me the shoes off of his feet so no more sandal hiking. Thanks Rick. Marcyand Retro got in so they lived, awesome. TV is a little hard to handle. Yesterday we bought three pounds of flathead cherries, and its been red lips ever since. All in all Scapegoat was the business. This is All Star and Hoo Ra we love you Detroit, good night.

"The Bob"

We made it! 7 days, 100 miles through a one million acre wilderness. After hitching to Maria's Pass on Highway 2 we headed in on ATV roads. Did countless stream crossing and met some real old montana cowboys, all smiles and six-shooters. Then we saw no one for almost 2 days. We hike through huge hauntingly beautiful burn areas and dense lodgepole pile tree tunnels. The amount of water in this place was astounding and following rivers to streams to springs on passes and then down streams to more rivers did nothing to lessen the mystery of this ecosystem. Only one wrong turn and backtrack and not too bad of one at that. The rest was averging 15 mile days and hanging a bear bag before last light. We took a dip in Dean Lake, an aquamarine alpine cirque with pebble beaches. Just as we we geting out two guys on horseback and two geologists came out of the trees. After that we met an outfitter from a large trail ride group at our campsite next to My Lake. Day six was The Chinese Wall, the main attraction of the Bob Marshall Wilderness, and rightly so. Here the divide is a massive cliff face with the trail following along its base and above its huge valley drainages. We spent so long gawking at this amazing feature that we left ourselves only three hours to do the nearly nine miles to our next campsite. Before we made a run for it we met Nate and Dave, two backpackers driving crosscountry. We broke out our food bags and swapped a few items. The day out to Benchmark was full of people as we passed mule train after mule train and a large Forest Service crew. We made it out to the trailhead and our feet touched gravel road for the first time in a week. After camping by the airstrip and watching a helicopter land and take off. we hiked down the road to the Wilderness Ranch where we recieved our kickbox and extra goodies courtesy of Nick's family, thanks so much! We talked with Shelley and she poured us some green Kool-Aid but informed us that her husband had just left for Augusta 15 minutes before we got there. So we took our big box and sat out in the scarce shade by the road, reading and snacking for a few hours until Wally picked us up. he was out exploring where his father had built roads with the WPA in the thirties and had a brouchure from 1932. He took us as far as the lake and, after teaching us a bit about fly-fishing said if we were still around when he was done he'd take us into town, ...we were. So here we are in Augusta with the dry plains all aroud and jagged mountains on the horizon. We ate at the Buckhorn Bar, a unique place and watched Obama on Fox News at Wagons West Motel. Tired but happy, and amazed by all we've come through, we are plotting our course through the Scapegoat. Talk to you in Lincoln. -Alex

HOO RA!

Well faithful followers we are back on the trail. After a solid week of East Glacier hospitality including meat 3 times a day yuck, pitch and putt, and heated scrabble tournies we are back to business. I, Nick, had logged about 30 miles previously and Alex about 60 miles. But who cares. Whose countin. We had a pleasant departure from the Krause family at Two Medicine with a brief walk through Aster Park area, Kelly identified a plethora of wild flowers and so began my list. On a side note I have three lists and more to come, a knot list, a animal sighting list, and a flower list. On this day we saw a female moose and her baby 2 cute.
We camped at Two Medicine a couple nights, one night we got a six pack of warm beer cans, what to do but tie them to our rope and throw them into a glaciated river, , Montana ice chest!How sweet it is! So we took off 7/10 the alternate route through dry fork canyon which ended with Old mAn Lake, a cirque, looks like a ice cream scooper scooped out a mountain and dropped a lake in, then hit Pitamakan pass. I could say more but it wouldnt do it justice. We ended the day at about 15 miles a solid day with great vistas. Oh yeah I found a tick in my underpants, luckily I caught the sucker gosh close call. The next day we headed up to Triple Divide Pass with our day packs lite load, and I think we found Alex's trail name, HOO RA!, he was just looking super military/Operation Freedom Bird. Anyways we saw some awesome rocks that are unexplainable to any of your human explanations. On this route we discussed Ishmael and the state of humans and our relation to the world. Up past the rocks we saw a family of Mountain Goats that let us real close, the baby was 2 cute. Triple Divide Pass was so epic, this area decides the water shed between the Atlantic, Pacific, and Hudson Bay in the space of my hand. When we peeked the pass their was a group of super cute girls which is part of a phenomenon that I like to call Cute Chipper Girls on Every Pass phenomenon. We took in the space around us or at least attempted to, failed because we have not the tools.
Back to base camp for lunch and then a stroll to Grizzly Medicine lake for breathing and looking. We were greeted at dinner by stories of curious Grizzlies down the trail 3 miles, and Florida couple with many gifts of food, hello two dinners and dessert. We retired early for preparation for the long and awesome day ahead of us.
We began day 3, 7/12 back towards Two Medicine. We made it the 6 miles back to Pitamakan Pass tired; storms were threatening but our decision to do the 4 mile ridge walk was reinforced by an Ohio couple also bound for it. We did the snow field up to the ridge, and viewed the expansive skies hinting in different ways. Geometry was present in rock structures atop the mountain. We could see red rock meeting lakes, snow capped mountains, alpine forests, and water falls all with a shift in your stance. The ridge trail was on average a foot and a half wide. With imminent death a slip away but it doesnt seem that bad when your up there. We met some Spaniards that offered us ague about 20 feet from the source oh me oh my, tasty. By far the most epic thing I 've seen here or anywhere else for that matter probably ever. We did the walk and bid farewell to our favorite part so far. After about an hour of down hill switchbacks we hit our stride and started going for the gold. After about the 16th mile we realized we could ford a creek to go right by a camp store, inevitably we went through the icy cold waters, and made it to the store. Here we may have had the best microwave hamburgers of our lives, and ate all the junk food in there, HOO RA! We meandered back to find a site. In all this the extent of my groin chafing was made apparent. Thanks to Alexs brilliant medical advice to Benadryl on it, a serpent breathed on me and would not stop. Alex accompanied me to the icy cold lake to submerge my nether regions, felt better and got some sleep. Thanks Alex.
Today it rained right off the bat, so we waited for the shuttle to take us to our Hostel lodging at Brownies. While waiting we met Michelle and George long distance hikers, looking to finish the CDT after 5 years, thanks for the lite weight tips guys.
We've just been eatin and drinkin dank Montana micro brews since.
Tomorrow we will prep for our biggest challenge yet in the Bob Marshall Wilderness a hundred mile 7 day segment. So I guess we will sign off until then, but we love you guys and miss you. Bye.

Gettin' There

Well Nick and I strolled into the U.S.A. on the morning of June 29th
We had been making final preparations and hanging out with my dad and brother in Waterton Lakes National Park north of the border.
We entered Glacier just a few hundred yards after customs. The trail descended through dense and buggy forest before opening up to low wildflower meadows along the Belly River. The first bare peaks of the Rockies loomed above us.
Day two brought us to Dawn Mist Falls, where the Belly River makes a thundering 60 foot drop. Next we soared over 2500 feet up to Red Gap Pass we we had our lunch in the company of molting mountain goats. A large chunk of blue-grey rock stood out against the red. Its surface was the smooth and serpentine texture of the 1.6 billion year-old Pacific seabed that was heaved up to become the peaks of the Rockies.
After camping at Poia Lake we made our way down into Many Glacier on day three. Nick's heels were shredded and bleeding; he was going to need more than a few days to recover. Fortunately my family was going to be hanging around and he could recouperate with them. I pressed on alone and did a 13 mile day up past Morning Eagle Falls and over Piegan Pass. By the time I made it to Going-To-The-Sun Road my right heel was giving me blister trouble!
I had to make a choice. Risk my heel getting worse and deal with the difficulty of staying motivated alone or accept temporary defeat and get off the trail or push on solo yet farther.
I decided to go for broke and try to make it over Triple Divide Pass and down to my resupply in Two Medicine.
Things were going well until I realized I was a day short on food. Then the Duct tape fell off of my heel. I had another choice to make. Try to stretch my food and deal with my foot or head for the road. I chose the road. Then another choice, two extra miles in to my reserved campsite and seven out the next day or five extra miles on top of the twelve I'd done already to make it out that day. The road won again and I made it a 17 mile day. I topped it off with my first hitchike, thanks for putting up with my stench Violet and Brian.
I made it into East Glacier Park just in time to find everyone sitting down to dinner at the Whistle Stop. Scince then, Nick and I have been lounging in luxury, enjoying restaraunt meals and Montana micro-brews, Moose-Drool is delicious. We are heading back out on the 9th to bag Triple Divide Pass and then its on The Bob.